


Welcome Home

by groseille



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Anxiety, Canon-Typical Violence, Cuddling & Snuggling, Just hints at the start, Like lots of it, M/M, Self-Esteem Issues, Swearing, The Mighty Cuddlepile
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-28 22:51:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17796254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/groseille/pseuds/groseille
Summary: “Caleb, what is that!”Jester hops off her seat and skips towards the far corner, where Caleb is now partially obscured by what looks like giant translucent double doors. He steps from behind them, examining them curiously.“If I finished the incantation correctly, and I have some reason to believe that I did, this might be...” he raises his hands and gently pushes the doors in, “our new home for the evening.”---------Fjord has anxiety and a crush and Caleb learns a new spell.





	Welcome Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [madnessiseverything](https://archiveofourown.org/users/madnessiseverything/gifts).



> Written for the prompt "domesticity", which I might have taken some ~liberties with.

_“AAAAGGHHHH!”_

A piercing shriek, then the low crackle of ice climbing up the furry leg, freezing tendons, tearing shattered flesh apart. The creature gives out one last roar and then its body softens, the limbs giving out, its uncannily human eyes still focused on Jester, then hazy, then, finally, void.

“Jester!” several voices cry in unison, and Fjord’s gaze follows the flashes of movement dumbly. In a swirl of blue, Beau rushes in first, pushing the giant leonine paws out of the way, grabbing Jester’s bloodied hands, then pushing again, then grabbing for arms, and shoulders, and knees, making sure she’s still here, still alive, still with her. Caduceus moves to help, but before he can reach, Nott appears on the other side, the paw in her way almost the size of Nott’s whole body.

They’re okay, Fjord thinks. They’re fine. They survived. On his left Caleb just lets out a sigh, so wet it’s almost more of a whimper, and slowly slides down the wall.

“Hey, hey there,” he runs his hands up and down Caleb’s arms, half a gesture of support, and half a desperate attempt to gauge the amount of damage. Concentrating is not easy, but he has to. They all depend on him here. Fjord pushes through the painful fog in his head and tries again.

“You okay?”

“Ja, I’m fine,” Caleb responds, so calm he almost believes him, “You should check on the others.”

Fjord does. And they are alright. Well… no less than usual. As Yasha gently pulls him away to give Jester some space (“Have you seen her teeth! Oh my god oh my god oh my god, Nott, she almost got you!”), his mind finally starts slowing down its dizzying spin.

“That’s a pretty bad tear,” Yasha states matter-of-factly and pokes him lightly in his side. He is blinded by pain for a second, but wills the feeling away, gritting his teeth.

“I’m fine,” he tries, and scoffs at himself for not sounding quite as convincing as Caleb did minutes before. Yasha doesn’t respond, just pushes a piece of his armour out of the way and gently snakes her hand under his tunic. Her fingers are cold, but the touch spreads warmth around the point of contact and the pain subsides.

“This is mighty kind of you,” Fjord says with weary gratitude.

“Don’t mention it,” and with that she is gone.

Afterwards he finds himself absentmindedly wandering around the dark chamber, examining the creature’s hoarded treasure and trying to calm his racing mind. Small mounds of junk populate the area, here and there giving off a mildly inviting sheen. Fjord stumbles a couple of times, foot catching on a dropped goblet or chipped statuette, and curses under his breath. This garbage can’t be all there is to this place! The beast seemed deadly in its cleverness, so there has to be some value to all of these trinkets and baubles and knick knacks and… books?

Still unsure whether his find is actually worth the fuss, Fjord reaches around the haphazard pile with both arms, doing his best to grab the whole thing, and slowly walks back to where Caleb is sitting exactly the way he left him, gaze distant and unfocused.

“Hey…” the trinkets pour out of his hands in a small clatterfall, landing next to Caleb’s outstretched legs. Fjord crouches next to the pile. Not wanting to spook, he gently brushes his fingers on the sleeve of Caleb’s frayed coat.

“Think I might’ve found somethin’ interestin’. To get you out of your funk.” 

With this Fjord picks the book up and turns it around, looking for any indication of what it might be. Caleb’s eyes focus sharply, first on the fingers on his arm, then on the tattered cover in Fjord’s hands. The yank that follows is as quick as it is unceremonious.

“Right… I’ll leave you to it, then.”

With an almost inperceptible grin Fjord returns his attention to the rest of the pile. Time passes as he sorts through the rubbish. Most of it feels like going through a hoarder’s backyard. There are several small polished stones of varying sizes that he diligently lays out in a line to his right. He contemplates calling out to Nott in a playful tease, but beats the impulse down – there’s time for that later. Next is a string of wooden beads click-clanking lightly against each other when he raises them in his hand to get a better look. A couple of small purple-and-blue ceramic horses that Fjord pockets fondly, taking a quick second to glance in Jester’s direction. As he inspects something that possibly maybe perhaps could be a copper dishware of some sort, and hesitantly pushes it towards the designated “weird shit for Caduceus” pile, he hears Caleb mumble something on his right.

“Did you say somethin’?” As Fjord turns, Caleb looks momentarily startled at having been heard but meets his eyes with a quietly agitated expression.

“I said that this is a really good find. Thank you, Fjord, truly.”

“It is? Well, I’m glad I could help. What is it exactly?”

“A spellbook.”

As if to demonstrate, he turns the book slightly towards Fjord and starts leafing through the pages absent-mindedly, too fast for Fjord (or anyone, really) to see what’s written on them.

“Nothing particularly flashy, the majority of these incantations are strictly utilitarian. A shame that spells like these get overlooked so often. People tend to believe magic has to always come with a spectacle.”

With a good-hearted chuckle Fjord turns back to his task.

“So, what I’m hearin’ is _don’t_ teleport you out of harm’s way with a huge crack of thunder next time you’re in trouble.” Out of the corner of his eye he notices Caleb’s ears take on a slightly pinker shade.

“Travelling with you bunch, I’ve long since learned of all the benefits of blatant theatricality,” Caleb concedes, and there is a hint of a smile behind his dry tone.  
A playful silence sets between them, and Fjord turns his attention back to his hoard. He spends the next five minutes turning a small polished bone in the shape of a runic circle in his hands. As he chucks it on the ground with a huff of frustration and moves on to a large brass tube with long tentacle-like protrusions, Caleb gasps beside him.

“Ist das…?” he grabs the little bracelet-like object and brings it closer to his face. “Ja, it is!”  
With that he closes his eyes for a split second, as if trying to remember something, and starts leafing back through the pages of his book. Fjord, his interest piqued, waits for the outcome.

Once Caleb finds the right page, it’s as if a tightly wound spring is finally let loose inside him. He scrambles to his knees, pawing at his left side impatiently, pushing his ratty coat aside to reveal the neatly holstered tome underneath. Once the book is out, he lays it on the ground carefully and opens it on one of the later pages. Intrigued beyond words, Fjord follows all of his movements. He praises himself internally for realizing that the enchantments in the now discarded book and Caleb’s look surprisingly similar, if written by noticeably different hands.

As if reading his mind, Caleb starts muttering, “I’ve been experimenting with this spell for months but I was missing the formula for the ginuflixum and nothing I tried worked. See, this is not a classic Transmutation spell, because I’m not really turning existing _objects_ into new shapes, but I’m also not pulling energy out of thin air, so it’s not Evocation either, thus I could not just copy the module I used for our little bubble...”

Fjord follows somewhat, mentally running through the few lectures Caleb has given him before, during particularly uneventful watches.

“You see, what I am attempting to do is essentially harness my knowledge of the extraplanar possibilities to punch a hole in the fabric of this present reality that would lead us to the particular interplanar space which I can logically argue must… hold on. Mr. Clay!” 

Fjord startles from the loud call only to realize his mind has wandered off. As he returns back to the present, Caleb is not there anymore. His chest pangs with momentary disappointment before his eyes locate the ginger head and brown coat a few feet away. Caleb says something to Caduceus in the same agitated manner, and grabs himself around the elbows, rolling impatiently on the balls of his feet while the firbolg slowly reaches into his side-bag. He fishes something out – a spoon? – and puts it in Caleb’s outstretched hand. With a nod and a smile Caleb turns, marches back to his spot and plunks down next to the open book again. Fjord watches, wide-eyed.

Caleb lays out the spoon and the bone bracelet in front of him, then reaches into his pouch and brings out what looks like a small fragment of a column or wall, edges jagged and a little ink-stained. Once he’s done, he starts chanting, going through hand motions that are undeniably magical in nature. Fjord follows every movement like entranced, recognizing some of the passes, trying to understand the semantics behind the gestures, like Caleb has explained to him a few times before. As one hand draws an elegant circle around the wrist of the other, there’s a sudden throb in Fjord’s sternum. Caleb is casting in such deep concentration that the perpetually pained expression behind his eyes gives way to intoxicating confidence, if only for a moment. Suddenly Fjord feels like he’s intruding on something very private and personal, and he clumsily pushes himself up to his feet.

“I’ll… check on the others...” he says hollowly, a hot blush starting to rise up his neck. To his relief, Caleb is not paying attention.

He starts walking towards the rest of the group, but stops just short, catching Nott’s eyes, full of badly disguised suspicion. 

“What is he doing? Is he hurt?” her raspy voice betrays a sharp edge and, despite their height difference, Fjord feels like she’s towering over him.

“No! No, he found a book and is just trying out some new spell. Somethin’ about extraplanar travel. Sounds impressive, doesn’t it?”

Everyone looks over his shoulder, and he follows their gaze. Caleb is still casting, now framed by a faint shimmer. Fjord hears a low chuckle behind him.

“That he is.”

He turns back to find Caduceus smiling, not watching Caleb like the rest, but looking directly at him. “Yeah,” – Fjord echoes, suddenly unsettled, as if he was just caught stealing candy before dinner. As he wracks his brain for a longer response, Jester and Nott gasp in unison.

“Caleb, what is that!”

Jester hops off her seat and skips towards the far corner, where Caleb is now partially obscured by what looks like giant translucent double doors. He steps from behind them, examining them curiously.

“If I finished the incantation correctly, and I have some reason to believe that I did, this might be...” he raises his hands and gently pushes the doors in, “our new home for the evening.”

They follow him inside like a flock of ducklings, uncertain but curious. The hallway that meets them is pitch dark, the only lights flickering in from the cavern they’re leaving. Caleb hesitates for a moment, and Fjord hears the familiar quadruple “fwomp” of his Dancing Lights. With the added globules of light he can make out a large foyer still some distance off, ending in a grand staircase that splits off and loops around the room on the second floor. He hears Jester gasp softly again, “Caleb! Is this…”

As she’s finishing her half-whispered question, Caleb mutters something under his breath, then raises his voice, with just a tiny hint of self-consciousness.

“Licht..?”

Fjord feels momentarily blinded and his gut instinct summons his falchion before his mind can interfere.

“Argh! Dude! What the fuck! Gross!”

His eyes adjust to the sudden brightness. Beau is nearby, swiping angrily at her face and top, trying to wipe the seawater stains off through the power of sheer indignation. Jester runs past them and stops at the bottom of the stairs. 

“No way! Caleb! This is my house! Are we at my mom’s? This is so cool!”

As the blinding flames seem to be gradually dimming (Is Caleb talking to them? No, that’s insane!.. Isn’t it?), Fjord looks around. The hall indeed looks a lot like the Lavish Chateau that very first evening they visited it and heard the Ruby sing. Rich velvet curtains hang off the rafters of the wooden ceiling, illuminated by the numerous candelabra lining the walls and the stair railings. A few tables close to the staircase are set up for guests, and just as Fjord sees this, a smell of something delicious reaches his nose. While he’s processing this thought, Nott hops up on the closest table and without a word shoves an entire fried fish into her mouth with a deafening crunch. As if in response, Fjord’s own stomach rumbles and the entire weight of their long, long day suddenly settles on his shoulders.

He walks to the next served table and carefully lowers himself on one of the chairs. Caduceus follows suit, examining the dishes set out in front of them with great curiosity. As Fjord reaches out and grabs a bun out of the basket in the middle, Caleb finishes his quiet dialogue with the candles and turns to them.

“This is not the Lavish Chateau, I’m sorry, Jester. It is an extradimensional dwelling. Meaning that, technically speaking, we’re not _anywhere_ right now, we’re just hiding inside the universe’s wall insulation, if you will. I needed a floor plan, and I’m not much of an interior designer… I hope you don’t mind.”

“You made an entire mansion for us?!” Nott pipes up, closely mirroring the incredulity in Fjord’s inner monologue.

“Well… ‘Made’ is perhaps too strong of a word here, a more appropriate phrasing would probably be ‘conjured’, as this space existed beforehand, and I just shaped–”

“Caleb,” Beau interrupts with exaggerated seriousness, before slapping a hand on his shoulder, “This is really dope.”

“Danke. I have been working on this spell for a while but just couldn’t get it right. You should thank Fjord, he found the book that allowed me to put the finishing touch on it. Not to mention the last component.”

“Wha…” Fjord’s heart picks up speed. “Caleb, I… I don’t know what to say… This is incredible! I had no idea anything like this was even possible. You… you made an entire mansion for us! With your mind!”

“Again, ‘made’ is somewhat incorrect,” Caleb frowns at himself, before continuing, “This is quite irrelevant at the moment. What I’m saying is, we’re hidden in the space between planes of existence, and the entrance to this dwelling is not easily detectable. But, it’s still out there in the cave we just left, and I would prefer to take the necessary precautions. Feel free to explore while I set up an alarm outside. I tried to detail individual rooms before casting, but some of it might appear under-developed.”

With this he starts walking back towards the entrance, while Jester shoots up the stairs with the speed of a firework going off. A few moments later her voice echoes from the second floor at a volume that betrays a touch of Thaumaturgy.

“It’s my room! How did you know! Cay-leb! This is so cool!”

“He asked your mom when we went to Nicodranas last month,” Beau’s alto booms from what sounds like an adjacent room, “Also, a training ground? Fuck-ing swe-et, Caleb!”

Fjord turns to look at the entrance. The doors are still wide open, and beyond them he can see Caleb, hands and knees on the ground, drawing a wide circle, a spool of silver string in one hand and a book in the other. Fjord smiles softly, then shakes his head and wills himself to his feet.

“Off to investigate? Tell me if you find anything interesting,” Caduceus gets up and slowly shuffles towards the kitchen.

“Right.”

Fjord starts up the stairs. Everything around him feels just this side of ridiculous. The soft plush carpet, the velvet curtains, the heavy decoratively carved rafters, even the faint prickly smell of coastal spices. It’s almost but not quite one of the feverish dreams his imagination would conjure after one too many nights spent in the woods during their early days, eating stale bread and shitting in the bushes. Just another hour and Beau will shake him awake for his watch, and just as his luck goes it will probably start raining.

As he reaches the second floor, one of the doors on his left opens, a Nott-shaped shadow sprints out, heads for the next door over and slams it shut behind her. A polyphony of raucous laughter follows, as the girls seem to be settling into their new environment with surprising ease.

Fjord looks around, trying to gauge which way to go. The second floor looks like an inn hallway, with doors lining up the walls on his left and right. Each door seems to have a little board attached, decorated with pins and pieces of paper. One of them is already sporting a huge picture of a dick, and as Fjord comes closer he sees the name “Jester” carved on top of the board with a careful hand. As he looks over to the adjacent door, that one says “Beauregard”. Fjord glances down the corridor and his gaze becomes unfocused for a second, as fleeting memories of Caleb describing his dormitory at the Academy flash through his mind. Equal parts embarrassed and touched by this arrangement, more fitting for a bunch of teenagers, than a group of hardened adventurers, Fjord turns around and heads for the other side of the hallway, looking for the door with his name on it.

As he steps inside, he’s overwhelmed by familiar smells – wood, brine, tar and damp rope. This is a room in a house, but it looks like a captain’s quarters, minus the view and the pitching floor. It’s familiar, and welcoming. And uncanny. Fjord walks in slowly, heads to the bed and carefully lowers himself down. Here, in the quiet dark of his own room the low incessant buzzing in the back of his mind picks up again. How did they get here? And where are they heading? What new dangers linger behind the corner? How does he keep them safe, this little crew, this family of his? After gods know how long, Fjord just puts his face in his hands and exhales. Worrying won’t help. Moping around in his room won’t help either.

As Fjord throws his head back and forcefully exhales again, he catches himself subconsciously running through the Tide’s Breath’s list of infractions, trying to calculate how much trouble he’s in for sneaking into Vandran’s quarters without prior invitation. He shakes his head, reminding himself that he’s been a ship captain in his own right, but his droning brain just conjures up Avantika in response. This is insufferable. 

He gets up and makes a few steps, buzzing with determination, but as soon as he paces the length of the room, it dissipates. He makes a few more steps and sits down on the edge of the bed once again. Guilt and shame tie themselves together into a tight knot in his belly, as he ponders the lengths Caleb went to to make them all feel at home in this weird extradimensional box of wonders. And he can’t even appreciate it like a normal person. He didn’t even say thanks.

With this thought Fjord shoots up again, this time almost giddy at the opportunity to leave the room and delay the inevitable solitary sleep. As he carefully closes the door behind him, he can hear muffled voices two doors down. He thinks he recognizes Caduceus’s bassy tones and Yasha’s soft vowels, overlayed with hearty laughter from the other side of the hallway. That means he might find Caleb alone. Fjord’s heart skips a beat in anxious anticipation. Then he glances around the hall and frowns: there are only six doors. Maybe Nott and Caleb are rooming together? He walks forward, towards the sounds of Beau delivering what he can only guess to be some sort of a smutty horror story, judging from her tone and the intermittent giggles. As he nears the door, he can clearly see it say “Nott” on top in the same neat handwriting. Fjord glances around. “Jester”, “Beauregard”. “Yasha”, “Caduceus”. “Fjord”. Where the hell is he?

As Fjord walks down the stairs, annoyance starts bubbling up in his gut. Does Caleb have a master bedchamber on the bottom floor, just to remind them all that they’re tolerated but the favours only stretch so far? Is it supposed to be another one of those warnings not to get too close, as he one day disappears into the night? How many times are they supposed to prove their loyalty? How many more hints is he supposed to drop before Caleb understands how he feels?

As he reaches the ground floor, his eye catches a half-open door on the opposite side of the kitchens and his simmering anger dissipates. The lights in the foyer are dimmed, and he can only recognize different shades of gray at this distance, but the faintly shimmering surface is unmistakable even with this lighting. Fjord picks up the pace and seconds later he’s at the entrance. The room is small and, as Caleb would probably say, strictly utilitarian, but he can make out a few bookshelves stuffed with tomes at the back and a writing desk in the corner. The rest of the space is taken up by the familiar ten-feet-tall bubble of energy he has entered every night for the last two months.

His curiosity piqued, Fjord steps through the barrier, half-expecting resistance that never comes. Inside he is greeted by the familiar warm smell of dust, leather and warm bodies, but what he sees makes his heart jump uncontrollably for a moment, before he reminds himself everyone else is upstairs. The floor of the room is covered in rugs and blankets – their usual fare for a night in the woods, – and Caleb is curled up in the back, hands tugging the bedroll close to his body, Frumpkin splayed against the small of his back. Nobody else is here, a couple of bedrolls lying unpacked in the corner, and Caleb looks small and lonely in this suddenly giant empty dome.

Fjord’s abdomen floods with warmth that gently tugs at his lungs. With a plan instantaneously forming in his head, he steps out of the room for a minute and walks to the table he had sat at when they first arrived. His bag is still there, where he left it, leaned against one of the chairs, waiting expectantly. He rummages through it, pulls out his own bedroll and heads back.

Trying not to make any sounds, he carefully unclasps his pauldrons, unlaces his bracers, then takes his armour off, laying it out on the chair next to the desk. After, he gingerly steps inside the dome again, unwraps his bedroll, lays it out and climbs inside, keeping Caleb between the cat and himself.

His heart is racing at his uninvited intrusion, but he notices his mind slowly unwind from his previous ruminations. Lying on his back, he puts his hands behind his head and takes a deep steadying breath. Caleb’s rhythmic breathing helps ground him further, and he realizes his eyelids are pinching from exhaustion. He tries to will himself to sleep but his body refuses to comply. After a few minutes of staring at the ceiling he remembers what he initially came down here for. 

“Caleb?”

He keeps his voice low, torn between the immediate desire for conversation and the guilt of waking him up after the day’s tribulations. Caleb doesn’t respond, but he hears a judgemental cat-whine from behind the man’s back. Then a tiny clamp of tiny jaws as Frumpkin yawns, and some shuffling as he adjusts his position. Afterwards silence falls again.

“Hope you don’t mind my barging in uninvited,” Fjord continues, deciding that maybe this is for the best, considering everything he wants to say.

“Figured you could use some company... You know, I think I like this better too. I mean, don’t get me wrong, what you did for us today was mighty impressive. I’ve never seen anythin’ like this in my life. And you just went and did it with your mind, just like that. I know I’m never gonna get tired of seein’ you pull shit like this out of thin air. So thank you. But… you gotta know you don’t have to. No need to prove yourself useful, no need to prove anythin’. We love you, Caleb. I… I love you. For who you are, not for what you can do. ... Y’all keep telling me I’m some sort of a sweet talker. I wish that was true. I wish I was better at these things, so that I could just explain to your face.”

Fjord huffs in frustration and turns his head towards Caleb. His soul immediately disappears somewhere around his heels, as his eyes meet Caleb’s steely blue gaze. For a few unbearably long moments they just look at each other in silence, and Fjord starts wondering whether his heart is ever going to beat again. Then the second passes and he sputters.

“Shit!… Caleb!… I…”

As he shifts to his elbow, his other hand held up defensively in the universally recognized gesture of ‘I can explain’, another thing happens that he is completely unprepared for. Caleb’s hand appears from his bedroll and reaches out towards Fjord, careful but precise. Fjord watches, dumbfounded, as long fingers intertwine with his, then turn his hand with a gentle tug. As he lets his hand be taken, Caleb gingerly brings it to his lips and brushes a light kiss against his knuckles. Then his expression changes to the pained look Fjord is very familiar with, and he closes his eyes. After a second Caleb takes a deep breath and on the exhale tugs their linked hands under his chin.

Fjord’s heart is racing again, blood pounding a deafening rhythm in his ears. He waits patiently for Caleb to say something, and just when it looks like his lips might move, he hears muffled voices from the hallway. There is some rustling in the foyer, a few giggles, then a loud shush, followed by light steps quickly treading towards the room they’re in. Fjord hears the door open slightly wider, followed by Jester stage whispering, “See! I told you they’d be here!”

As Nott and Beau sneak in behind her, there is more rustling, followed by more giggles. Finally, they unwrap their bedrolls and Jester crawls into the dome, settling on the other side of Caleb, with her hand splayed possessively across Frumpkin’s body. Beau follows suit, draping her arm around Jester’s waist. Nott climbs closer to Caleb’s feet and turns on the spot a few times, trying to figure out the best position, then curls up in the V-shaped space left between Fjord’s and Caleb’s legs.

Right as they settle down, Caduceus’s bassy rumble reaches Fjord’s ears. In a few moments the door swings open and closed again, this time letting him and Yasha in. They both assess the situation in complete silence, then move to pick up the two unwrapped bedrolls leaning against the desk. As they lay them out, Caduceus moves to splay out on his back behind Fjord, while Yasha climbs into her roll half-way, then leans against the wall next to Beau, her sword carefully laid out on her lap.

A few more seconds pass and Caduceus’s calm breathing turns into a soft puffing snore.

“That was quick!” the stage whisper comments. Beau’s and Yasha’s snorts are cut short by Nott’s equally ill-concealed “shhhh!”. Fjord grins and watches Caleb’s lips tug into a faint smile. He brings Fjord’s hand from under his chin and soundlessly touches it with his lips again, then covers it with his other hand and slowly stretches his index finger out to point towards Fjord.

Then Caleb’s voice rings in his mind.

“You are kind. We’ll talk tomorrow. Sleep well, F-yord.”

Fjord snorts inaudibly before responding.

“G’night Cay-leb.”

And with another deep exhale he closes his eyes and drifts off to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading and happy Widofjord day! <3
> 
> This is my first ever finished fic, I had lots of fun writing it, and hopefully there are many more to come :)
> 
> The enemy they were fighting is a [Gynosphinx](https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Gynosphinx#content), and the spell Caleb casts is [Magnificent Mansion](https://roll20.net/compendium/dnd5e/Magnificent%20Mansion#content).


End file.
